Lumpy: Blog

I've been a little quiet trying to get the next Taylor story ready, so a quick update. The next story (called Election Day) is almost ready and will start posting at some point in May (I don't know quite when yet, since there is still a little work left to do on the last third of the book, but it's real close). I'll have more info in the next few weeks. Thanks for everyone's patience for how long it takes between these stories.

I know it's been a while since the 4th book finished, but I have some good news. The 5th John Taylor story is finished and going through the last rounds of editing now. I expect it to start posting either Aug. 31st or Sept. 5th, depending on the number of revisions it has to go through.

I'll post up more information later this week when I have a better idea of how long it will take. Stay tuned (Here, my author website, or twitter will all have the info).

The last chapter of Burying the Past went up today. Good news is the next Taylor book is in process and I hope you won't have to wait too long to read it.

I'm seeing a lot of messages about people torn about the ending. One of the big things I believe in is that choices have consequences. Did Taylor do the right thing? It's hard to say. What is true is he made his choice and now he has to live with the fallout from that choice.

The good news is this isn't the end of their story. It's just one more step.

Plus, what fun would books, especially series, be if there were never any conflict or problems.

Excited that the story has started posting. This book closes out a chapter on Taylor's life and sets up a thread that will lead through the next 3-4 books.

I just realized I had comments turned off. They should be on now and you should be able to leave comments.

(Let's try this a final time. I have the except and info here and pulled the off-site link out so it should show properly).

It's taken forever to get this out, but the 4th John Taylor book is final and ready to go.

Chapters will start posting here a week from tomorrow on Sat. Nov 23rd, and will post once a week like my other stories (the whole thing will post up).

For those interested in reading the whole thing early, all details are up on my twitter tstarnes_author or on my author site (which is linked through my profile here).

Here's an except from the first chapter:

Excerpt

"This isn't yours," Loretta Whitaker said, her voice rising in frustration more than anger.

"I just wanted to be seeing what it looked like. You can keep it. It is ugly color, anyway."

"That's not the ... " Whitaker started to reply before being cut off by a slamming door.

Taylor leaned his head back, squeezing his eyes shut, knowing what was going to happen next.

"You need to do something," Whitaker said in an annoyed, but no longer yelling, tone.

"I'll talk to her."

"This needs to stop. I know she's been through a lot, but she needs to start learning to respect other people's property."

"I know."

Taylor sighed and stood up. It had been six months since Kara had come to live with them and this was a somewhat regular occurrence by now. Taylor couldn't blame Whitaker for her frustration. The first two months had been very rough. Kara was prone to outbreaks of screaming, a complete defiance of any kind of structure or order, and was constantly trying to pick fights.

Things had started getting better, even Whitaker would admit to that, some of the time at least.

Kara still had quirks. She did not want to be touched, ever. No hugs, no handshakes, no contact at all if she could avoid it. She still woke up with pretty violent nightmares. Still, a lot of the anger had started to recede. They'd even recently been able to shift from three times a week therapy to just once a week, her shrink saying she was making excellent progress.

Even though the fights were down to just once or twice a week it was still tough on Whitaker, who was almost always the target. She'd been amazingly patient, not holding a grudge against the teenager and not staying mad for that long after each fight ended. It was putting a strain on their relationship.

"I'm not mad," she said, letting out a long breath. "Just try and get her to stay out of our room. Okay?"

Taylor stopped in front of her, his arms snaking around her middle.

"I'm sorry this has been so tough on you," he said for the hundredth time.

"I know, and it's getting better. I just ... I'm trying not to take it personally, because of everything she ..."

"She doesn't hate you, you know that, right? She just doesn't have all the tools you or I have for dealing with conflict."

"I see you talked to her doctor again," Whitaker said with a smile, knowing that wasn't a phrase Taylor would normally have used.

"She reminded me of something."

"What was that?"

"That not every outburst is about her past trauma. She reminded me that, besides everything else, we also took in a teenage girl. She said we should expect some push back, that it was healthy."

"God," Whitaker said, pulling out of Taylor's embrace, putting her hands on her hips, and looking at the ceiling. "If I was even a tenth this bad, I really feel for my parents. I should call my mom and apologize."

"I'd say 'I'm sure you weren't,' but we both know that would be a lie," Taylor said with a smile.

Whitaker rolled her eyes and headed towards their room, "Just go talk to her and do your thing. Otherwise, you get to live with two pissed off women."

"Yes, ma'am."

He heard a snort come from Whitaker's direction as he headed to the other bedroom in their apartment, glad to see she at least had her sense of humor intact.

"Kara," Taylor said, knocking on her door. "Can I come in?"

There was a pause, then the door opened, the girl's red hair flapping as she turned and stomped back to sit on her bed.

"She sent you to yell at me, yes?"

"It's not like that and you know it."

"Mne prishlos' imet' delo," Kara started to say before Taylor put up a hand.

"In English, please. Your tutor asked us to keep you using it at home as much as possible, for practice."

"Fine," she said, her lower lip going out in a pout. "I deal with bitches before, blaming anything that went missing ..."

"I thought you admitted to taking it?"

"I ..."

"How are you being blamed for something going missing if you admitted to taking it?"

"Whatever," she said, the pout becoming more pronounced.

"Early on, you demanded we stay out of your room unless invited."

"So?"

"So, we've done that, right?"

"I guess."

"Don't you think if we've agreed to stay out of your stuff, and out of your room, that you should do the same thing for us?"

"I just wanted to find different color lipstick. I didn't like any I have."

"Did you try asking her if you could look through and borrow something?"

There was a long pause.

"Kara?"

"No."

Taylor let out a sigh. His personality wasn't really cut out for being the calm, rational one. If anything Whitaker should be the one to do this, she was much better suited for calm, dispassionate reasoning. He'd always been the shoot first and ask questions later kind of person. And yet, he was the only one, aside from Kara's shrink and Mary Jane, the girl who'd been held captive with her the previous winter, that Kara could deal with on any kind of rational basis.

They'd already gone through three tutors because of it. Thank goodness Suzette Caldwell, Mary Jane's still very thankful and very rich mother had felt the need to pay for both the tutors and the psychiatrists for Kara, in return for Kara's help in freeing her daughter.

"Then why are you mad? Because she got mad or because she called you out?"

"I don't... I don't want lecture."

"I get that. You've been on your own for a long time, and you don't need anyone telling you what you should or shouldn't be doing, right?"

"Right," she said, her face taking on a determined expression.

"So, what lecture did she give you? Was it the 'You need to be more responsible' one? Or maybe the 'You should respect other people's property' one? Just let me know which lecture she gave you, and I'll go talk to her and make sure she understands what to avoid. Ok?"

"Umm, I ..."

"Problem?" Taylor asked, raising an eyebrow.

"She didn't say things like that."

"So what did she say? I can't go and talk to Loretta and fix this if I don't know what happened."

"She said she didn't want me taking her things."

"Huh. Ok. I mean, I've heard you say that before, like that time you misplaced one of your books and thought she took it. That's a lecture?"

"It wasn't words she said, it was how she say it."

"She screamed at you?"

"No?"

"She said it really mean?"

"Why are you doing this?"

"Doing what," Taylor said innocently. "I'm just trying to understand what happened."

"You know what you're doing," Kara said, dropping back into Russian. "You're trying to get me all confused. You know exactly what I mean and why I'm pissed."

"I do," Taylor said in the same language. "However, I think why you think you're angry isn't why you're actually angry."

"Okay smart man, why am I angry?"

"Because you want to establish dominance, and she's a tough nut to crack. It's what you learned, dealing with the other girls ... before. You didn't have control of your life, so the parts you could control, you each wanted to be on top. It's what you know, and you haven't convinced yourself yet that you don't have to do that here. Also, let's go back to English, please."

She made a Phfff sound and said in English, "Shows what you know."

"Ok, maybe I don't. I'm not a shrink, hell, that was all BS anyways. Maybe it's something you should think about though. I want you to consider something."

"What?"

"She's welcomed you into our home. Not just welcomed, but she's really tried to let you make it feel like your home. When you wanted to paint this room, she got it ok'd by the landlord, right?"

"Yeah."

"When you said you missed food from home, she learned to make several dishes you said you liked, right?"

"They weren't great, but yeah."

"She's trying. You can see that, right?"

"I guess."

"So maybe cut her some slack. This hasn't been easy for her, either. Maybe it's not as big of a change as you've had to deal with, and maybe she doesn't have as much baggage to deal with, but it's still been tough on her, too. But she's trying, 'cause she wants all the things you want for yourself."

"She never says anything to me."

"Have you told her that you actually like her, too?"

"No ... I don't ..."

"Come on, I've seen you doing little things around here to help out when you think no one's looking. I've seen you around her, when you're not angry. You like her, a little bit."

"She's ok," Kara said but didn't make eye contact.

"And have you told her you think she's ok. That you like living here with us?"

"No."

"You know, you two are more alike than you think. Maybe that's why you're butting heads with her so much. You're both very proud, and don't want anyone to think you can't do everything all by yourself."

"And you're not too proud?"

"Hell no. I'm constantly asking people for help getting out of my screw-ups."

A small burble of laughter escaped Kara's throat in spite of herself, belying the angry exterior she'd been trying to maintain.

"You have that right. You are mess."

"You better believe it. So, are we done with all the yelling and slamming doors?"

Kara let out an exaggerated sigh and said, "Yes, I'm done."

"Great. I was about to talk Loretta into sitting down and streaming a movie. Wanna join us?"

"Fine, but I don't want to watch any of her silly crying girl movies," she said, brushing past Taylor.

'Great,' Taylor thought, 'something else they can fight about.'

He headed out of Kara's room, closing the door behind him and crossed to the room he shared with Whitaker, knocking softly on it as he opened the door.

"Hey babe, we ..."

Taylor stopped abruptly as Whitaker held a finger up to her lips, the other hand cradling her cell phone against her ear.

"Got it. Give us thirty minutes."

She snapped the phone closed and turned to Taylor.

"Problems?" he asked at her expression.

"Yeah, Joe wants us to come up to a meeting at his office that's going on right now."

Joe was Joe Solomon, Whitaker's boss and a man that had very little use or patience for Taylor, who he saw as some kind of amateur interloper who regularly stuck his nose into bureau cases.

"Us?"

"Yes, us. He was very specific he actually needed you in the meeting."

"Joe's calling *me* in on a job?" Taylor asked, his tone rising in disbelief.

"I don't know if it's a job, he just said something was going down, and he wanted to see you in his office ASAP."

"Shit. What'd I do to piss him off now?"

"I don't know if you did anything, but it sounded serious. We need to get going."

"Fine. Man, I just got Kara off her rampage, now I gotta tell her movie night's off."

"She'll live."